Enemies Forever
by Kel6
Summary: If there’s one thing every Hogwarts student learns, it’s that dislike of others is not based on a personality clash, or anything so trivial. It’s based on one word, shouted by a hat. No one sorted into Slytherin could ever be friends with one sorted
1. Chapter 1

Title: Enemies Forever  
  
Summary: If there's one thing every Hogwarts student learns, it's that dislike of others is not based on a personality clash, or anything so trivial. It's based on one word, shouted by a hat. No one sorted into Slytherin could ever be friends with one sorted into Gryffindor, it's just impossible. First in the Nothing is Impossible series.  
  
Rating: PG  
  
Disclaimer: The characters and situations etc belong to J. K. Rowling, for those of you who didn't know. I am not making money from this, it's purely for my own enjoyment.  
  
Author's Notes: Please read and review. This is officially the first in the series, but I also have a Prologue to the series on ff.n.  
  
~*~  
  
'Another five seconds, Mr Black, and you'd have been late.'  
  
'Darn it, so close, d'you mind if I go wait outside for half a minute? Wouldn't want to mess up my record and be on time, would I?'  
  
Professor Adams rolled her eyes and gestured for him to sit. Unsurprisingly, he was the last in, so he had little choice, the only free desk was right at the front. Sirius dumped his stuff on the desk and sat down, looking around the room before he did so. Potter and his little friends were right at the back, of course, probably because they'd got to the lesson at least ten minutes early. The rest of the Gryffindors were further towards the front. Those in Slytherin, with the exception of Sirius, were sitting as far back as possible without being near Potter.  
  
Sirius couldn't really blame them, 'Gryffindor' hung around Potter like a bad smell, he was good at lessons, he stuck up for everyone (except Slytherins) and he always worked so hard it was depressing. Well, that was how he seemed, anyway. Sirius had never imagined himself making any enemies at school, certainly, he hadn't expected various members of his extended family to give him a second glance, but he'd never thought he'd find someone who really disliked him. James Potter had been that person.  
  
'Are you listening, Mr Black?' came the voice of Adams.  
  
'Certainly, Professor,' he said, politely. 'I am captivated by every word you say,' she raised an eyebrow, but let it go. Professor Adams was one of the few professors who genuinely seemed to like him, the rest viewed him as a trouble-maker (which he was) or exactly like the rest of his family (which he most certainly wasn't).  
  
'Now, as I was saying, although you are only first years, Professor Dumbledore has decided that you're old enough to do this. Personally, I believe it will prove useful.'  
  
Sirius raised his hand.  
  
'Professor,' he began. 'You know a minute ago I said I was listening? I was, of course, but I've quite forgotten what you were talking about.'  
  
'We're doing werewolves,' she said, wearily, well used to him by now.  
  
Sirius nodded. He was unsure if this was in their textbooks, or not. He knew a fair amount about werewolves, but what he did know was completely biased. He'd learned to take what his parents told him with a pinch of salt; they had so many prejudices, Sirius had never paid any heed to their opinions.  
  
'Now,' began Adams again. 'Just out of interest I'd like to find out your opinions of lycanthropy and the problems that surround it.'  
  
Sirius glanced around the room again. With the exception of three people, the whole room would probably hate them. Those three were himself, and two Gryffindor Muggle-borns. That was the problem with the wizarding world; anyone with at least one wizarding parent was brought up to hate werewolves, vampires, giants and anything else like that.  
  
'What do you think, Miss Evans?' she was talking to one of the Muggle- borns, Sirius had never bothered to find out her first name.  
  
'Well,' began the girl. 'I don't really know a lot about them, from what I've read they can be dangerous and I know I wouldn't want to get bitten.'  
  
'They're only dangerous on the full moon,' said Sirius, loudly. 'The rest of the time they're completely normal people who, I'm sure, would like to lead normal lives.' He got some very odd looks for that, but he didn't care. Eleven years with his family and three months at HogwartsHoH as the Slytherin outcast had left him very unperturbed at being different.  
  
'Oh,' said the Evans girl, coolly. She didn't like him, he could tell from the look on her face. He didn't remember saying anything to her, but still she didn't like him.  
  
'How would you like it if you were bitten because the Ministry didn't have strict enough regulations concerning werewolves?' came a voice from the back. Sirius almost grinned, this was familiar territory: trying to irritate Potter as much as was humanly possible.  
  
'If I was bitten by a werewolf,' he said. 'I would make a long list of everyone who I'd eat.'  
  
'Black. . .' warned Adams.  
  
'Fine, fine,' said Sirius. 'Potter, get the Ministry to let werewolves out on a full moon and then I'll get bitten and tell you how much I care. Right now they're treated like animals.'  
  
'They're classified as "beasts" by the Ministry.'  
  
Sirius sighed in an overly-exaggerated way, Potter was such a Gryffindor it made him ill. 'Yes, of course, how silly of my to forget that the Ministry is right. I will bow down to the Ministry and accept it's ruling for everything.'  
  
'If you two start getting stupid I shall stop this discussion and you will all be writing,' put in Adams. 'And I'm sure some other people in the class may have something to contribute.'  
  
James looked at his followers for support.  
  
'I wouldn't want to get bitten,' said Pettigrew. Peter Pettigrew was, in Sirius' opinion, a bit of a wimp. Merlin knew why he was in Gryffindor. He agreed with everything Potter said, he was probably just an over-sized house elf or something.  
  
'What about you Remus?' asked Potter.  
  
Lupin shrugged. 'I don't care, it doesn't affect me,' he said. Sirius blinked, in general, Remus Lupin was just another Potter-fan, well, that's what it seemed like anyway.  
  
'Does anyone else have anything to add?'  
  
'Werewolves aren't people,' came Severus Snape's voice, from the edge. Greasy-haired and long-nosed, Severus Snape worked even harder than Potter, especially with Defence Against the Dark Arts. He was a distant cousin of Sirius', but then, Sirius had so many distant cousins it meant nothing. He and Sirius had never got along, although they kept their fights private. 'When they're bitten they become part wolf. They will kill innocent people due to bloodlust. If they were all to be locked up then the disease could be stopped from spreading.'  
  
Typical of Snape, to have the last word and to make it a morbid one. Sirius sighed, there was no point in arguing with Snape about something like this. 


	2. Chapter 2

Title: Enemies Forever  
  
Summary: If there's one thing every Hogwarts student learns, it's that dislike of others is not based on a personality clash, or anything so trivial. It's based on one word, shouted by a hat. No one sorted into Slytherin could ever be friends with one sorted into Gryffindor, it's just impossible. First in the Nothing is Impossible series.  
  
Rating: PG  
  
Disclaimer: The characters and situations etc belong to J. K. Rowling, for those of you who didn't know. I am not making money from this, it's purely for my own enjoyment.  
  
Author's Notes: Please read and review. This is officially the first in the series, but I also have a Prologue to the series on ff.n.  
  
~*~  
  
'You're in Slytherin now, Sirius, you need to accept that. You're not going to make friends with Gryffindors, or Hufflepuffs, or Ravenclaws. Everyone's going to assume you're just like your parents, or like Bella and Narcissa. You can't try to be what you're not.'  
  
'But it's just my house, it's not going to stop me from talking to people.'  
  
'You're so young, Sirius,' replied his cousin, Andromeda.  
  
'I'm not that much younger than you,' he responded.  
  
'You don't know Hogwarts, Sirius, being a Slytherin is a part of you and you can't change that. Just trust me, don't make any enemies in your house, and don't expect any friends in other houses. It's impossible.'  
  
~~~  
  
Andromeda, as usual, had been right. Nobody had given him a chance. She was lucky, she'd been a Ravenclaw, accepted (just) by the family, but free from the ties of being a Slytherin. Bella had told the whole house what a failure of a Black he was, and nobody from any of the other houses would give him the time of day. Now he was in his second year and had no one but himself for company.  
  
He shifted his legs under him, trying to get more comfortable, and peered at the book on his lap. It was a history book about the time of Grindelwald, he'd always been interested in History, but the lessons had proved insufferably boring. He'd escaped the castle to read and he was now half way up a tree on the outskirts of the forest. He didn't know what it was forbidden, nothing had come and tried to kill him yet.  
  
'Remus, are you sure this is the only place where we can go?'  
  
'Scared, are you?'  
  
'What do you take me for? How many times did we come in here last year? It's just it's broad daylight.'  
  
'You said you wanted to know. Well, I'm prepared to tell you. But only in private, we have to be sure no one else could be listening.'  
  
It was Potter and Lupin. Presumably Pettigrew was with them as well.  
  
'Well go on then, tell us,' came Pettigrew's voice, confirming Sirius' suspicions. He listened intently; this could get interesting. He'd already heard Potter say they went into the Forbidden Forest a lot, something he could never imagine the ever-perfect James Potter doing.  
  
'Right. well.' Lupin sounded more hesitant now. 'I suppose.'  
  
'Spit it out, Remus,' said Potter.  
  
'Yes er. you wanted to know where I go every month, right?' So much for being "prepared to tell them" thought Sirius. Still he had noticed Lupin's regular absence, he wondered what the big secret was. 'The truth is. I'm a werewolf.'  
  
Sirius nearly fell out of his branch.  
  
There was silence down below.  
  
'If you'd rather not hang around with me any more, then I'll understand, s'long as you don't tell.'  
  
'What on earth do you take us for, Remus?' replied Potter, loudly. 'Don't be ridiculous, we're friends and we're sticking with you, isn't that right, Peter?' Sirius could only assume that Peter was nodding in his incredibly pathetic way. 'It doesn't matter at all, you're still Remus, right?'  
  
The scene was so remarkably sickening in its Gryffindor-ness. Still, at least that meant there were another couple of people in the world who didn't view werewolves as freaks. Sirius wondered if Potter was thinking back to the Defence Against the Dark Arts lesson the previous year.  
  
Sirius shifted again, and lost his footing. Frantically trying to grab hold of a branch he felt himself falling. He crashed through a layer of leaves and smaller branches before he grabbed something and held on.  
  
'Shit!' that was Potter. Sirius gritted his teeth, prepared for the worst, and let himself drop the rest of the way, landing with some dignity.  
  
'Language, Potter,' he said. Potter held his eye.  
  
'What did you hear?' he demanded. The scene reminded Sirius strangely of their first meeting, only that had been in the corridors. Potter had been the rude one, not him, as it was then.  
  
'Not a lot,' he replied. 'I was reading you see.' Potter had drawn his wand, his followers stood in the background, Pettigrew seemed nervous and Lupin was white-faced.  
  
'Tell the truth, Black,' snarled Potter.  
  
'Of for Merlin's sake, your stupid little friend is a werewolf. Big deal! Perhaps you should keep your voices down if you don't want to be heard.'  
  
'You-You're not going to tell anyone. . .?' Potter seemed genuinely surprised.  
  
'Of course I'm not you stupid twats. Why would I? The teachers will already know and no one else would give a shit what I have to say. They stopped believing me after I convinced the whole class the Potions dungeon was flooded and you lot all waited for forty minutes in the Transfiguration room. And that was first week of first year. Why would they believe that Lupin's a werewolf if it comes from me?'  
  
He could have sworn Potter's lips twitched slightly.  
  
Potter turned back to his followers. 'So what are we going to do about this then? We can't just let Remus have to go through this every month, it's painful. Surely there's something we can do.'  
  
Sirius lent against a tree. He hadn't been completely excluded from this, in an odd way. Possibly because Potter wanted as many ideas as possible.  
  
'There is nothing, you know that,' said Lupin, in what Sirius could have sworn was an annoyed voice.  
  
'There must be some way,' said Potter.  
  
'Well,' said Sirius, slowly. 'I can think of something you could do, but it would involve breaking a lot more than just the school rules.'  
  
'Go on then,' said Potter, turning back to him.  
  
'Become Animagi,' said Sirius, with a shrug. 'Then you could be with him on full moon nights and have as much of a laugh as its possible for three completely different animals to do.'  
  
Potter exchanged a glance with the other two, both of whom looked unconvinced.  
  
'And how would we do this?'  
  
'There's bound to be a book in the restricted section on it,' replied Sirius. 'I know of one that there will probably be. My family have it, I've never read much of it.'  
  
'Could you help find this book?' asked Potter, hopefully.  
  
'All right,' he replied, with a shrug.  
  
'Meet me outside the Slytherin common room at one in the morning,' he said. 'I know how to get there. Don't tell anyone else. I'll be alone too.' Lupin opened his mouth to protest. 'Two of us are less likely to be caught than if all four go,' he turned back to Sirius. 'You'll be there?'  
  
'Of course, I already said I'd help, see you then.'  
  
'Black?'  
  
'Yeah?'  
  
'Thanks for this.'  
  
'Save it until we find the book,' he replied, then headed off as quickly as he could, wondering what on earth he'd got himself in for. 


	3. Chapter 3

Title: Enemies Forever  
  
Summary: If there's one thing every Hogwarts student learns, it's that dislike of others is not based on a personality clash, or anything so trivial. It's based on one word, shouted by a hat. No one sorted into Slytherin could ever be friends with one sorted into Gryffindor, it's just impossible. First in the Nothing is Impossible series.  
  
Rating: PG  
  
Disclaimer: The characters and situations etc belong to J. K. Rowling, for those of you who didn't know. I am not making money from this, it's purely for my own enjoyment.  
  
Author's Notes: Please read and review. This is officially the first in the series, but I also have a Prologue to the series on ff.n.  
  
~*~  
  
The corridor was cold and almost completely dark, with the exception of a couple of flickering candles. Sirius glanced up and down the corridor, and looked at his watch again, Potter was late, of course. He'd probably got lost, typical. He felt the strange sensation of being watched, although there was no one there.  
  
For some reason, one of an older Uncle's many stories came back to him: 'Be prepared for everything, like I was. I was supposed to be meeting a business associate who I didn't trust, so I hid and watched him for ten minutes. Turned out he was planning a trap. Stupid fool didn't think to look for me, did he? He just revealed everything.' His Uncle hadn't been talking to him, instead to his brother, Regulus, and he'd probably been making most of it up, but Sirius had been listening anyway.  
  
He looked around again quickly. Was Potter watching him? Waiting for an army of Slytherins to spring up and start talking loudly? Or was Sirius the one who was being far too trusting and was about to be ambushed by an army of Gryffindors? He doubted Potter knew any complex disguising spells, but he didn't know for sure.  
  
He could always bluff.  
  
'Come on, Potter,' he said, staring idly at the ceiling. 'This is getting silly now.'  
  
To his immense surprise, a figure appeared on the opposite side of the corridor.  
  
'How did you know I was here?' Gryffindors.  
  
'Never heard of bluffing have you?' he said. 'What have you got there?' Potter's irritated look was immediately replaced by his show-off one.  
  
'An invisibility cloak,' he said, proudly.  
  
'I'm amazed you'd trust me enough to show me.'  
  
'It makes life easier for both of us if we use it,' he said, with a shrug. 'As long as you don't tell, if you do I'll kill you. If you tell about anything I'll kill you.' Sirius made no comment, instead he took a corner of the cloak to look at it.  
  
'Quite impressive, Potter, shall we get going then?'  
  
Sirius hadn't quite bargained on the awkwardness of being under the cloak with Potter. They tried to keep as far away from each other as possible, with very unsuccessful results, as they were in a very confined space. Mercifully, no teacher or ghost was around to hear them.  
  
Inside the library, Potter pulled the cloak off and stepped away from Sirius very rapidly. Had Sirius' reaction not been identical, he might have been offended. As it was, he caught Potter's eye and then looked away hurriedly.  
  
They headed over to the Restricted Section, at the back of the library. It felt oddly cold in there, for no real reason, unless the enchantments on some of the books were a lot more powerful than they should be.  
  
'Don't touch anything,' warned Sirius. Potter opened his mouth to argue, but decided against it, probably realising that Sirius knew what he was talking about. Sirius scanned up and down the shelves, looking for some recognisable system with which the books were stored. No such luck.  
  
'Got any parchment?' he asked Potter.  
  
'Why?'  
  
'To write down the name of the book so you can help me look?'  
  
'Can't you just tell me?'  
  
'It's not English.'  
  
'Then how will you read it?'  
  
'Do you take me for some sort of idiot, Potter? It's magic.' In the faint light from their wands, Sirius was pleased to see that Potter looked slightly embarrassed as he handed over some parchment and a quill. Sirius copied the four large symbols he could remember onto the parchment. 'That's not all of them,' he said. 'There are about three more, but if you see a book with all of this on it then it's most likely the right one. It's about this thick, and this big' he gestured the size and got on with looking.  
  
It was Potter who found it, of course. Sirius knelt down on the floor next to him and peered at the pages, it was magically locked, so it all appeared in the same code as the title. He closed his eyes and remembered spying on his parents when they looked through it. He tapped it with his wand and muttered the spell, there was no point in giving Potter every advantage.  
  
He let the book fall open again and began leafing through it to the section he wanted. There was bound to be an easier way to find out this information, as what they wanted started on page seventy two and finished on page fifty three.  
  
'Couldn't you have found a book with all the pages in the right order?' hissed Potter, irritably, as Sirius flicked to page one hundred and twenty five, then back to twenty seven, before he found exactly what they wanted.  
  
'The author liked to be secure,' said Sirius, with a shrug, and gestured to the shelves that seemed to tower above them. 'If you want to search this lot for something that's written the right way then it's up to you, but you'll probably get your head bitten off before you've gone through ten.'  
  
Potter pulled a face but began to hurriedly copy down all the necessary information in his neat handwriting. Sirius set about committing the page to memory, he had every right to try and become one himself, even if he wasn't going to play with Potter and the idiots.  
  
'What's the next page?' asked Potter, after a while.  
  
'Twenty-eight,' said Sirius, in a patronising tone.  
  
'Yes, I know that, but where does this section continue?'  
  
'Twenty-eight,' he said again, unable to suppress a grin and Potter's scowl when he turned over and found the only two pages in the book that were in the right order.  
  
'Have you got the order of pages memorised or something?'  
  
'Nope, it just says so in the top corner,' Sirius poked the book. It wasn't in English, but different runes and other languages had always been interesting to learn. Potter muttered something rude under his breath.  
  
About an hour later Potter had copied everything he thought would be necessary and pocketed it.  
  
'We'd better get back then, or Sni-I mean-Snape will be wondering where we are,' said Sirius.  
  
'What were you going to call him?'  
  
'Oh, nothing.' Snivellus was the nickname Sirius only called Snape when nobody from another house was watching. The two of them managed to look remarkably friendly to everyone outside Slytherin.  
  
'You liar, what were you going to call him?'  
  
What did he want more? To appear like "one of the Slytherins" in front of this Gryffindor? Or to get half the year calling Snape Snivellus? 'I was going to say Snivellus, just what I've grown used to calling him, he hates it.'  
  
James laughed aloud.  
  
'I thought you and him were friends.'  
  
'Merlin, Potter, you're such a Gryffindor! Do you know nothing about my family?'  
  
'Er. they're all into Dark stuff.'  
  
'And they hate Muggle-borns, and werewolves, anything not into Dark. Snivelly's a distant cousin and he's a horrible git! The same as the rest.' Sirius stopped himself before he said anything else. He'd said far too much already.  
  
'Don't you-don't you get on with your family?' Potter was incredulous.  
  
'Have you ever heard me singing the praises of the Dark side? Or swearing at Muggle-borns?' asked Sirius. He couldn't help but blurt things out; he'd never imagined Potter to be that naïve.  
  
'But you're always such a Slytherin.'  
  
'That, Potter, is just how you see me. You expect me to be a Slytherin so I am one. Not my problem: yours.'  
  
Potter was silent for a few seconds.  
  
'I suppose anyone who calls Snape "Snivelly" can't be all bad,' he said, finally, risking a shy smile.  
  
Sirius shrugged. 'Nobody's all bad, we just seem it sometimes,' he was just reiterating some of the things Andromeda had told him, after all, she always knew what she was talking about. 'Let's head back,' he added. 'I need some sleep.' 


	4. Chapter 4

Title: Enemies Forever  
  
Summary: If there's one thing every Hogwarts student learns, it's that dislike of others is not based on a personality clash, or anything so trivial. It's based on one word, shouted by a hat. No one sorted into Slytherin could ever be friends with one sorted into Gryffindor, it's just impossible. First in the Nothing is Impossible series.  
  
Rating: PG  
  
Disclaimer: The characters and situations etc belong to J. K. Rowling, for those of you who didn't know. I am not making money from this, it's purely for my own enjoyment.  
  
Author's Notes: Please read and review. This is officially the first in the series, but I also have a Prologue to the series on ff.n.  
  
~*~  
  
After dragging himself out of bed in the morning and eating as many sweets as he could find to wake him up, Sirius headed down to Potions. It wasn't as though he was never out of bed at night exploring the castle, but it just never got any easier. He threw his stuff down on to his desk and closed his eyes, wishing the night was a few hours longer.  
  
'Is there anyone sitting here?'  
  
Sirius would have groaned, only he was too tired. It was Potter. How bloody typical of a Gryffindor to think that after one late night trip to the library, they could be friends and all would be shiny and happy. He briefly searched around for a sarcastic remark, but discovered his brain just wasn't working, instead he just muttered: 'Get lost, Potter.'  
  
Potter ignored him and sat down, but to the horror of everyone in the class. Even Potter's minions looked shocked, so at least they had some sense.  
  
Sirius did consider asking Professor Hunter if he could move because he couldn't stand the smell, but he decided that would be far too rude and instead just ignored Potter as much as he could. Potter seemed to have completely forgotten that they'd been fighting since the first week of first year, and that it was all his fault.  
  
After the lesson he packed and left as quickly as he could, with Potter following him closely. Couldn't he take the bloody hint?  
  
'I want to talk to you!'  
  
'Well I don't want to talk to you, in case you hadn't noticed. You're being a twat!'  
  
'What happened to being so completely different to everyone else in your house? You don't want to talk to me because you don't want your precious Slytherin *friends*, or at least the fools you've been pretending are your friends, to treat you even worse than they do now!'  
  
'Are you trying to tell me what I'm thinking?' demanded Sirius. 'I don't want to talk to you because any friendship we have is impossible, we can't just pretend we're in the same house.'  
  
'I didn't say we could. I just thought maybe we could try and be polite to each other.'  
  
'You thought so differently last year, Potter, remember? I'd never even spoken to you and you hated me right from the start. Just because I was in Slytherin.'  
  
'Look, my parents have always said-'  
  
'Yes, well, you wouldn't want to do anything *mummy* or *daddy* might not like, would you? You'd better bugger off now, before you get infected with Slytherin-ness and lose your beloved popularity.'  
  
'You bastard!' he snapped, cracking and throwing a punch, whacking Sirius on the nose.  
  
Sirius was too shocked to retaliate, if there was one thing Potter never did it was get into a physical fight. Duels were fine, but punches, never.  
  
'You tell me not to pretend I know you, yet you do exactly the same, you bloody hypocrite,' continued Potter.  
  
'Bloody being the appropriate word,' said Sirius, quietly. 'That was one heck of a punch, Potter, I didn't know you had it in you.' Potter looked thoroughly shocked at Sirius' reaction, and he stopped ranting.  
  
'Here,' he said, and offered Sirius a handkerchief.  
  
'Thanks,' he muttered. 'I'd better go get my books for Transfiguration,' and with that, he turned and practically ran off, back to his common room.  
  
*  
  
'James Potter punched you and you did nothing?' demanded Snape, loudly. 'What sort of idiot are you? You could at least have cursed him or something.'  
  
'Oh get stuffed, Snivelly, if I'd have cursed him and lost points you'd have been moaning at that,' replied Sirius. 


	5. Chapter 5

Title: Enemies Forever  
  
Summary: If there's one thing every Hogwarts student learns, it's that dislike of others is not based on a personality clash, or anything so trivial. It's based on one word, shouted by a hat. No one sorted into Slytherin could ever be friends with one sorted into Gryffindor, it's just impossible. First in the Nothing is Impossible series.  
  
Rating: PG  
  
Disclaimer: The characters and situations etc belong to J. K. Rowling, for those of you who didn't know. I am not making money from this, it's purely for my own enjoyment.  
  
Author's Notes: Please read and review. This is officially the first in the series, but I also have a Prologue to the series on ff.n.  
  
~*~  
  
James was in a rotten temper. Remus and Peter hadn't said anything about his sudden loss of sanity about sitting with that. that. Slytherin and he was glad of it.  
  
'Never again!' he snapped, to no one in particular. Remus and Peter didn't even look up from their work. 'Never again am I even going to bother.' He touched his right hand, it was clean now, of course, but he still couldn't believe he'd actually whacked someone, he'd never done anything like that before.  
  
After Black had ran off he'd managed to work himself up into an awful temper and wasn't calming down.  
  
'Why can't he just be reasonable? Why does he have to lose his temper? Why is everything my fault?'  
  
'Why do you care so much?' said Remus, calmly. 'Just ignore him, pretend it never happened and get on with your life.'  
  
Why did he care so much? How on earth could he let one person irritate him more than anyone else? He took a few deep breaths, and tried to think rationally: he could just pretend it all never happened and go back to being enemies with Black, which seemed to be what Black wanted; or he could just ignore him and pretend he didn't exist, probably not though, he was never one to let a fight go unfought.  
  
'Quidditch. . .?' suggested Remus, and James had to laugh.  
  
'I don't care what you say, Remus, that is not a magical, mood changing word.'  
  
'You just laughed,' pointed out Peter, smugly. 'It works every time.' James pulled a face.  
  
'I shall go right back to sulking if you're not careful.'  
  
'Done your Charms homework?' asked Remus. James blinked, trying to remember what they'd been set.  
  
'Yes,' he said, slowly. 'I think I have. I did it at lunch time. It was totally boring.'  
  
'Don't let Flitwick hear you say that,' said Peter, slyly. 'Heaven forbid James Potter show disinterest in a lesson.' James snorted, very few lessons actually interested him, they were all just so boring and basic. However, he managed to fake the perfect attitude, which made his life a whole lot easier when he got into fights.  
  
'Maybe I should be more honest with the teachers,' he said, thoughtfully. 'I could do a Sirius Black and arrive late for every lesson, cheek all the teachers and make it plainly obvious that it's me who's doing anything bad. That'd shock everyone.'  
  
Remus just rolled his eyes.  
  
'The day you act like Sirius Black will be the day I snog Severus Snape.'  
  
'Which do you think suits him better,' asked James. 'Severus, or Snivellus?' The other two exchanged glances and both burst out laughing.  
  
'That's brilliant, James!' said Peter. 'I'm sure he'd love that! How on earth did you come up with that?' James smiled.  
  
'As tempted as I am to take credit,' said James, grinning. 'It wasn't me, for a change.'  
  
'Who was it then?' asked Remus, curiously.  
  
'Nobody,' said James, with a shrug. Neither of the other two pursued it further. James picked up a piece of parchment and began to write.  
  
Mum and Dad, How are you both? Things are fairly good here, lessons are still rather easy but I expect we'll get on to some of the harder stuff soon. Douglas says that I'll probably be able to get on to the Quidditch team next year, as one of the Chasers is leaving. I could use a new broom though, they've got a new Cleansweep out, which is far better than my Nimbus.  
  
Sirius Black is being really annoying! He's a Slytherin in my year and, no matter how hard I try to be polite he always seems to be rude. I've given up on Slytherins, they're all the same. I sort of thought for a bit that maybe he was a bit better, but he definitely is not. I don't suppose you've heard of his family.  
  
I really have to go now, with homework and everything. I look forward to hear from you, love,  
  
James  
  
He read it through, it sounded all right. Hopefully he could get a Cleansweep for an early birthday present, and not have to wait until December. That was the trouble with brooms, new ones were developed so quickly.  
  
'Does anyone have an owl?' he asked. 'I can't be bothered to go all the way to the Owlery.'  
  
'Lazy idiot,' muttered Remus. 'And you should know by now that neither of us keep owls in our pockets.' James got to his feet.  
  
'Either of you coming?' Remus shook his head, but Peter got up.  
  
'I need a break from work,' he announced, and followed James out of the common room.  
  
*  
  
The three boys carefully studied the pages that James had painstakingly copied out of the library book more than once. Because there were two other boys in their dormitory, keeping them hidden had to be considered. James remembered the spell that had magically locked the book from which he had copied them; unfortunately, he had no idea how to do anything like that. Remus managed to find a fairly simple password spell that made the parchment appear blank until a password was said.  
  
The technique itself looked incredibly difficult. There were different spells and potions that needed to be used before the process of learning could even be started, and finding the animal was little more than a guessing game, although there was the help of a few charms.  
  
'You two don't have to bother with this,' said Remus, as he, James and Peter re-read the notes again, looking for anything they had missed that might make it seem easier.  
  
'Anything McGonagall can do, we can do.'  
  
'She's much older than us.'  
  
'So, she's a teacher, if we've no more skill than teachers then we've no hope.'  
  
'I've survived long enough though, I'm perfectly fine.'  
  
'Remus, we can do this, I'm sure it'll help.' Although James hated to admit it, Remus' problem wasn't the only reason he wanted this to succeed. As soon as Black had suggested it, James had been taken with the idea; and there was the fact that Black would be trying it too. He'd noticed, of course, that Black read every page through as many times as he could while James copied, and it was fairly obvious his intent was to attempt the same spell. James could not be the naïve-little-Gryffindor Black thought he was and ignore that fact. If Black was going to try, then so was he. There was no way he was letting a Slytherin beat him.  
  
'Anyone home, James?' came Remus' voice, interrupting his thoughts. James grinned.  
  
'Not right now,' he answered. 'You'll have to try again later.' Remus whacked him playfully on the arm.  
  
'You're mental.' 


	6. Chapter 6

Title: Enemies Forever  
  
Summary: If there's one thing every Hogwarts student learns, it's that dislike of others is not based on a personality clash, or anything so trivial. It's based on one word, shouted by a hat. No one sorted into Slytherin could ever be friends with one sorted into Gryffindor, it's just impossible. First in the Nothing is Impossible series.  
  
Rating: PG  
  
Disclaimer: The characters and situations etc belong to J. K. Rowling, for those of you who didn't know. I am not making money from this, it's purely for my own enjoyment.  
  
Author's Notes: Please read and review. This is officially the first in the series, but I also have a Prologue to the series on ff.n.  
  
~*~  
  
Dear James, It's good to hear from you again. I'm so glad you're enjoying school. Everything does get more interesting, but it gets harder too, although I'm sure you'll be able to do it. We'll see about the broom, you never know, you might be in for a treat if you get good exam results!  
  
On a more serious note though, James, I suggest you don't bunch all Slytherins together as being bad. I know you must be sitting there, reading this and wondering what on earth is wrong with me, but please just bear with me. I know when you were younger your father used to tell you that Slytherin was the worst house, and I thought at the time I might have been making a mistake in letting him do so, but, traditions are traditions, and it was important to him that you should be a Gryffindor, so I let it go.  
  
My mother was the sister of Sirius Black's grandmother, so you two are cousins of some description. I'm not saying this family is to be liked, because your grandmother was disowned for marrying into your grandfather's family, but you should remember that he is your relative. My advice is to just ignore him, and not get into too many fights. I would suggest you avoided fighting anyone, as it can damage any chance you have of becoming a Prefect.  
  
The best thing to do with the Blacks, is to keep away from them. I imagine Sirius Black has no idea of this, and I suggest you keep it from him.  
  
I'm sorry this had to be revealed in a letter, but I don't think I'd have had a chance to talk to you until summer if I hadn't.  
  
Your father says hello, lots of love,  
  
Mum xxx  
  
James read through the letter twice, unable to believe that it was truly from his mother. It was her writing, and it seemed real. It was also, knowing his mother, unlikely to be just a silly joke. He was related to the Blacks? The idea was astounding. And his mother was just telling him to back down and ignore the Slytherins, like becoming a Prefect was worth sacrificing his pride for.  
  
He crumpled the letter up and shoved it into his pocket.  
  
How could he be a Black? They were all so. . . so. . . Dark. Everything his father had said about their family made it seem like the exact opposite of the Blacks, and the Snapes, and the Malfoys, and numerous other families.  
  
'I'm nothing like them,' he muttered.  
  
'Pardon?' said Remus, who was nearby.  
  
'Nothing,' he said, hurriedly.  
  
He was fairly quite that morning, trying to work out ways that this could be completely wrong and untrue. Apart from the same colour hair, he and Sirius Black looked nothing alike or acted nothing alike. Perhaps his mother was wrong. She'd probably been misinformed, or heard wrong.  
  
'Er. . . Potter?' It was Black. James was by himself, waiting in the courtyard for Remus and Peter.  
  
'Yes,' he said, stiffly.  
  
'Here, and thanks,' said Black, and he handed over James' handkerchief that he'd borrowed the day before.  
  
'You're welcome,' said James, in the same, awkward, tone. Black turned to go. 'Black? I'm very sorry about the whole, punching thing yesterday, I didn't mean to.'  
  
'It's OK,' muttered Black. 'I had worse, I suppose I shouldn't have said some of that stuff.' That was his apology, James could tell.  
  
'Look, I was wondering if we could, sort of, agree not to fight. Maybe Gryffindors and Slytherins can't be friends, but we don't have to try and kill each other all the time.'  
  
'If I'm quite honest with you, Potter, I think I'd get bored very quickly with that,' said Black, with a twisted grin. 'Annoying Snivelly can only take up so much time, after all, there's only so far I can push it before I get cursed.'  
  
James blinked, he'd never imagined fighting with Black would qualify as being something fun, but that seemed to be the way Black thought of it.  
  
'Tell you what then,' he said, thoughtfully. 'We could team up for a while, not as friends, merely as partners in crime. And then when we get bored, we can go back to being enemies.'  
  
'You? A criminal? Potter, I'll give you something: you're crazy.'  
  
James shrugged. 'Seeming innocent is a sure fire way of getting away with things.'  
  
'Ah, but Potter, half the fun lies in getting caught and pissing off as many teachers as possible by waking them up at three in the morning. But, you know what? We could give it a go, with my brains, looks, and your cloak, it just might work.'  
  
'Prat.'  
  
'Moron.'  
  
'Stupid Slytherin.'  
  
'Idiotic Gryffindor.'  
  
James smiled slightly. They weren't friends, they never could be, but working together with Sirius Black made the idea of certain things much more interesting. Remus or Peter were good as friends, but they took a lot of persuading to break rules.  
  
Sirius was unsure what he'd got himself in for. Everything about James Potter was so Gryffindor, yet they might make a pretty good team. It didn't mean they were friends though; friendship would involve a lot more being nice and just wouldn't work between a Slytherin and a Gryffindor. The rest of the year was definitely going to be a lot more interesting. 


End file.
